STRASBOURG, France (CN) — The European Court of Human Rights heard arguments on Wednesday over whether extraditing a woman to the United States, where she faces a life sentence without the possibility of parole, would violate her human rights.
Lawyers for American Beverly McCallum argued before Europe’s top rights court that Italy would violate the European Convention of Human Rights if it extradites her to Michigan, where she faces murder charges, because she would have no chance for early release if convicted.
“It is an inhuman and degrading punishment,” McCallum’s lawyer Walter De Agostino told the Strasbourg-based court. His client remains in custody in Italy.
U.S. authorities had been unsuccessful in getting McCallum extradited from Pakistan, where she had been living for years, but Italian authorities picked her up in Rome in February 2020 when she used her passport to check into a hotel.
The 61-year-old mother of four is accused of the 2002 murder of her husband, Robert Caraballo, whose burned body was so badly damaged authorities were unable to identify his remains until 2015. Prosecutors say that McCallum, her then-21-year-old daughter and a friend pushed Caraballo down a flight of stairs and bludgeoned him with a hammer before suffocating him to death.
McCallum moved to Texas with her children after the killing and subsequently met a man living in Pakistan. After authorities identified Caraballo’s body, she moved there and the U.S. had been unable to get Islamabad to extradite her.
Since her arrest in Rome, Michigan prosecutors have assured Italian authorities that, if convicted, she would have an opportunity for parole.
“A life sentence without the possibility of review has ruled out,” Lorenzo D’Ascia argued on behalf of Italy. He called the possibility of McCallum receiving such a sentence “a hypothetical” as she hadn’t yet been tried.
Earlier this month, McCallum's now 38-year-old daughter Dineane Ducharme was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for her role in the murder.
This isn’t the first time the European Court of Human Rights has heard cases from defendants fighting extradition to the United States. In nearly all cases, the court has found their complaints inadmissible, citing the robustness of the U.S. judicial system. In 2014, however, the judges sided with a Tunisian man who was extradited from Belgium to Washington on charges of terrorism because he was facing life in prison with no possibility of parole. Nizar Trabelsi has been in a U.S. jail awaiting trial for nine years.
Following the McCallum hearing, the Strasbourg court heard another extradition case Wednesday. Ismail Sanchez-Sanchez, a Mexican national, is fighting extradition from the United Kingdom to the U.S. on drugs charges. He is also facing life without the possibility of parole.
The court is expected to rule on the cases in the coming months.
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